DP&L rate increase hearing today: What you need to know

There will be two local hearings this week on a Dayton Power & Light requested rate increase.

The Public Utilities Commission of Ohio (PUCO) has scheduled public hearings on the rate increase request — at 1 p.m. today, May 8, at the Dayton Municipal Building, 101 W. Third St., and then at 6 p.m. May 10, also at the municipal building.

The public will be able to testify at these hearings. The rate case affects some 459,000 residential electricity consumers in the Dayton area.

The Office of the Ohio Consumers Counsel (OCC) has asked the PUCO to have DP&L and other Ohio utilities to offset or reduce their rates in light of the last year’s federal corporate income tax cuts.

In November 2015, DP&L filed a rate case asking the PUCO to allow increases in DP&L’s electric distribution rates to its customers.

DP&L proposed to collect $65.8 million more from consumers for electric distribution service — service that includes poles, wires, meters and other distribution infrastructure and equipment — than it does each year today.

A typical DP&L residential consumer using 1,000 kilowatt-hours of electricity would pay about $4.07 more per month, or about $50 per year, under DP&L’s proposal, according to the OCC.

PUCO staff, in March, proposed an annual increase for DP&L of between $23.2 and $28.1 million.

Last month, the OCC raised its own objections, recommending a rate decrease for consumers. The office recommended that DP&L collect $560,000 less from consumers than is today being collected annually, citing the recent federal corporate income tax cut.

The PUCO has a hearing scheduled in Columbus for May 14, to hear testimony on the federal tax question.

After the hearings, the PUCO will make a decision on the rates.

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